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Clear pools are now choked with algae. It shuts down glass bottom boat rides because the water is no longer clear enough to see anything.

Swimming beaches at the springs are roped off with Health Department signs warning of polluted water.

When faced with something this sad and overwhelming, there’s a tendency to say it is the result of progress. But springs pollution is both preventable and reversible.

People have been rallying throughout the state to protest the decline of our water resources.

They unveiled a new Floridians’ Clean Water Declaration.

The campaign’s goal is to get as many individuals, organizations, businesses and elected and appointed officials as possible to sign the Clean Water Declaration and commit to work together to achieve its principles.

Politicians are responding.

Four Florida Senate committee chairmen agreed to support filing springs legislation. A draft bill would direct an estimated $378 million a year from documentary stamp tax revenue toward springs protection.

It is encouraging, too, to see that Gov. Rick Scott earmarked $55 million in his proposed state budget this year for springs protection.

Using public money to protect our shared public resource — water — makes sense.

But we need to demand that our leaders hold polluters accountable. Every day, factory farms send fertilizer and manure into our public waters when they could be controlling this on-site. These corporations must be required to meet specific pollution limits, and they should face consequences if they exceed those limits.

Scott and the Legislature have been selling out to polluters. Polluter lobbyists drafted the state’s rules on sewage, manure and fertilizer pollution, Scott’s administration adopted the weak language and the Legislature approved it.

Scott’s administration also fired staffers who dared to enforce environmental laws, replacing them with people who come from polluting industries. Environmental enforcement cases have plummeted. State regulators now get bonuses if they pump out permits faster.

Certain categories of major polluters are allowed to operate on the honor system.

A big polluter like an industrial plant would be fined if it spilled toxics into a river.

But that’s not true for Florida agricultural operations. It’s great for politicians to tell us they want to protect the environment.

But we should all make it clear that we want them to set real, enforceable pollution limits.